Crockpot Cauliflower with Tomato and Onion Gravy

Some days, you just need dinner to cook itself. This recipe is for one of those days.

Recently, our furnace decided to call it quits, so we had to have a new one installed. Next time this happens, I’m just going to move into a nice, comfy cave and light a huge fire. In the long run, it will be less of a hassle, and I know the fire will actually work.

Naturally, the only day they could come install the furnace was Halloween…a full week after determining the old one was dead. Perfect timing as the heat wave had finally broken and we skipped fall completely and went straight into winter temps. Seriously? A week????? With no heat???? No problem; blue is my color. I’ll just run to the hardware store and get a chisel so we can chip our way out of our ice blocks every morning. I’ve always wanted to wear every item of clothing I own all at once. Bucket list complete!

8:30 am on Halloween, a team of four guys arrived and literally spent ALL day at the house installing the new furnace. The Taj Mahal took less time to build. Incidentally, it was 72 degrees that day. Grrrrr.

By 6:00, I was so ready for them to be gone and our Halloween party to begin. Finally, at 6:30, the head guy called me over to the thermostat and demonstrated how it switched from heat to cold while I stood in my angel costume, flapping my wings and thinking decidedly unangelic thoughts. He explained that they had had trouble getting the AC to properly work, but it was now up and running.

As he scuttled out the door, I flipped the AC on, since it was about 1000 degrees in the house. And discovered that, although it clicked on, that was all it did. Darn. I should have definitely gone with a Little Mermaid theme this year as we were apparently living in the tropics now.

Next morning, I called the furnace people and the people who had installed our thermostat, since the furnace people had been poking around the wires inside the thermostat. The thermostat people arrived first, spent about two hours fiddling with their computer and asking me a million questions about the furnace.

Is it gas? Yes. Are you sure? Pretty sure since that’s what I paid for. Are you sure that they installed that one though? Again, I’m going to go with yes, but are you sure you want to go down this road any further since there is a butcher block full of knives ten feet away?

End result: the thermostat was working just fine, so the furnace must have been incorrectly installed.

Next up, the furnace people, who arrived, spent about two hours fooling around with the furnace and determined it was the thermostat that wasn’t working correctly.

Are you kidding me?????

I just spent two days waiting for people to come, spent a small fortune, still don’t have a working furnace and everyone is going to blame the other guy????????

And back to the thermostat people we go…

That cave is looking better and better.

Ingredients:

1 head cauliflower, greens cut off
2 large onions, halved and cut into slices
1 cup red wine
2 cups vegetable broth
1/4 cup tomato paste
1 Tablespoon dried basil
1 Tablespoon dried Italian Herbs
zest of 1 orange
4 cloves garlic
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 Tablespoon nutritional yeast

Directions:

Combine zest, garlic, olive oil, salt and nutritional yeast. Puree in high speed blender till smooth and creamy. Pour over the cauliflower and use a brush or your (gloved) hands to rub it into all the nooks and crannies. Let it sit and marinate while you cook the onions.
Sauce the onions 5-10 minutes, till softened (my crockpot has a saute feature, but you can do this on the stove, then transfer to the crockpot). Add the herbs and saute 1 minute till fragrant. Pour in the wine and bring to a boil. Cook till the wine is reduced and thick. Add the paste and stir in. Pour in the broth and bring to a boil.
Place cauliflower head on top of the onion mixture. Turn the crockpot on low, cover and cook for 5 hours.
When the cauliflower is done, carefully remove from pot and put on serving platter. Using a blending stick or blender, pulse the onion mixture to desired consistency, then pour into bowl or over the cauliflower head to serve.